Colored Backgrounds

[Ralph Cohen]

On Sat, 11 Dec 1999 22:47:18, David Gaskill wrote:

>
> However if they have, knowingly or unknowingly, sent me and 
>HTML e-mail it is reasonable to assume that their client can read the format 
>so I reply using it. I really don't regard the format as significant; the only thing 
>that really matters is that the person to whom it is addressed can read it.  
>

Although I use PMMail/2 for almost all my email activities, if I click
on a <mailto:> link on your website the Netscape Mail Composer widow
pops up.  If I unknowingly have my copy of Netscape configured to send
HTML mail, then your HTML reply to me would only be readable in
PMMail/2 with some inconvenience.  If you really don't regard the
format as significant, then why not stick with a format that can be
read without difficulty by the widest possible audience? 

Several years ago I found a Win3.1 shareware package that worked well
under WinOS/2 and decided to order several copies for my office.  There
was a notice on the company's web page that quantity discounts were
available so I emailed them a request for those prices and they sent me
an MS Word Document in return.  At the time I didn't have a reader for
that particular version of MS Word and WordPerfect refused to load and
convert the document, so I tried viewing it in a text editor but I
couldn't make sense of the text mixed in with the formatting codes.  I
emailed the company and told them about the problem but since it was
late on a Friday I didn't receive any response for three days.  Before
their response arrived on Monday, however, I had already found and
purchased several copies of another company's software instead.  While
it may be understandable that the first company assumed that anyone
interested in purchasing their Windows software would be able to read a
MS Word document, their assumption was both wrong and a little bit
costly.

Ralph Cohen

rpcohen@neurotron.com